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Volunteers
10/24/2002
Listen in RealAudio 
On April 28, one of the worst tornadoes ever reported on the East Coast barreled across
southern Maryland. Ten years ago, many of the spotter reports on a storm like this would have
come in through ham radio. Now the same volunteer spirit is moving onto the Internet, thanks
to the Citizen Weather Observer Program. Hi, I'm Bryan Yeaton for The Weather
Notebook.
When the April storm passed by Potomac Heights, one observer reported baseball-sized hail.
Another recorded winds of 125 miles an hour before he lost power near the town of La Plata,
where the tornado did its worst damage. Both of these reports passed through the Internet so
officials knew about the severe weather right away. For many years, ham radio operators across
the country have been avid weather trackers. A few years ago, these radio buffs helped create
a system that would bring data from amateur weather stations onto the Internet. Today, over a
thousand volunteers have wired their home computers and weather stations so that the data go
directly to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Every 15 minutes, NOAA
collects these reports, checks them for quality, and then posts them on a public Web page,
where they're pooled with readings from many other sources. This year the volunteer data is
even helping two research projects, one on air quality and temperature in New England and the
other on coastal storms near Florida. If you're interested in joining the Citizen Weather
Observer Program, check out our web page, www.weathernotebook.org.
Thanks to Bob Henson for volunteering today's story. The Weather Notebook is produced by the
Mount Washington Observatory, home of the World's Worst Weather. Their website is
www.mountwashington.org. Thanks also to Subaru of America and the National Science Foundation.
Today's Links
General info page:
http://www.findu.com/citizenweather/
Signup
http://www.findu.com/citizenweather/signup.html
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